Skylar & Plux: Adventure on Clover Island

Initially, the game will be released later this year for Steam, PlayStation 4 and XBox One but just like Yooka-Laylee, Skylar & Plux: Adventure on Clover Island is pushed back to January 2017, according to the latest gameplay walkthrough video of the Oasis level.

Figure 1: The current logo of Skylar & Plux: Adventure on Clover Island.

For those of you that aren’t familiar with Skylar & Plux: Adventure on Clover Island, it’s an indie 3D platformer game created by a Swedish video game developing team, Right Nice Games, and published by Grip Digital. Right Nice Games used Unreal Engine 4 to work on this upcoming indie, but nostalgic-evoking, collect-a-thon game.

For the first time in video gaming history, a female is taking the lead, in terms of buddy-duos. This is an uncommon thing in video games, especially mascot 3D platforming games, and there aren’t many strong-willed heroines these days. Therefore, this game isn’t following the status quo, making Skylar and Plux stand out from the ever-increasing line-up of video game double acts which is actually a nice change of pace. Majority of the time, a male character tends to take the lead (for example, Banjo is the lead protagonist and Kazooie is considered to be the witty, sassy sidekick) or there are two male characters (for instance, Ratchet and Clank) in most buddy-duos throughout the years.

Similar to Ratchet & Clank (PS4), Yooka-Laylee, Clive ‘N’ Wrench (this time-travelling adventure game have tons in common with the PlayStation 1 game, Bugs Bunny: Lost In Time), A Hat In Time, Psychonauts 2, Lobodestroyoyo and Crash Bandicoot, Skylar & Plux: Adventure on Clover Island is taking advantage of the resurgence and jumping on the mascot 3D platforming games renaissance bandwagon.

Figure 2: Introducing the interstellar bot-whupping duo from left to right: Skylar and Plux.

Figure 3: Skylar is the main protagonist of the game. The storyline of Skylar & Plux:

Adventure on Clover Island goes like this: CRT creates Skylar, who is part space cat (kind of akin to Ratchet from the Ratchet & Clank series), part weapon, but at the moment, she is incomplete. While CRT or the main antagonist is continuing with his generic villain monologue or his gloating at his evil lair, he failed to realise his experimental weapon have escaped. That is, until one of his robotic henchmen called Bob notified him of the situation. Whilst the main baddie is in slack-jawed disbelief, Skylar have set out on an adventure to become a heroine against her will to defy her makers, forging her new identity. Along the way, she encounters an owl-like or a bird-like character named Plux, who soon becomes her eloquent sidekick. Equipped with high-tech, futuristic gadgets and her cybernetic suit, she and her new partner embark on a quest to stop CRT and save their beloved home, kicking interplanetary butt in the process.

Figure 4: An aerial view of the desert/Oasis with the sun hanging over.

Figure 5: Skylar and Plux standing on a towering platform, overlooking the Oasis.

In the recent walkthrough footage, it introduces a new location known simply as the “Oasis” which is jam packed with blindingly fast, rotating platforms, time pedestals, bouncy, dark green, light green-spotted mushrooms and an abundant of sand and dunes as far as the eye can see for miles and miles, a brand-new, time bending gadget known as the Time Orb, new-fangled secret objects or items to pick up, newly-revealed voices from the titular main protagonists, new mechanical enemies such as robotic foes shooting a torrent of bullets or lasers from their turrets or barrelled arms and so forth.

Figure 6: Bending time to Skylar and Plux’s will, the Time Orb will let them to emerge out of battles unscathed.

Speaking of the new gadget, the Time Orb, it will remind a lot of gamers of the time portals (these time portals can only be synthesised by Sigmund whenever Clank requests for them) from Ratchet & Clank: A Crack In Time (the second game in the Ratchet & Clank Future trilogy), Clank’s time manipulating powers from Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction (the first game in the Ratchet & Clank Future trilogy) and the Time Bombs Clank used in Ratchet & Clank: A Crack In Time, due to its ability to manipulate time at its own free will. This ancient relic is created by the mysterious Sagus civilisation which slows down the flow of time when inserted with energy. If it’s placed on a pedestal, it maintains a sphere that enables Skylar and Plux to travel back to the past. Every time a pedestal is activated, it reverts time within Skylar and Plux’s surrounding area, depending on their current position in the level.

Figure 7: This section of the desert/Oasis is seen before in the teaser trailer.

As shown in the playthrough footage, the Time Orb gadget is also useful in combat against the persistent army of robots CRT dispatches as well as traversing through the sun-drenched oasis and jumping from platform to platform. Once the flow of time is slowed down to a crawl, Skylar and Plux can actually run rings around the rouge robots and hopping across the spinning platforms will be made safer. Towards the end of the playthrough video, there is a time pedestal, which is sitting precariously over a cliff. One punch should send it to the bottom of the cliff which can then be punched multiple times in order to move it across to a designated spot as presented in the aforesaid footage.

Not only that, but Skylar finally have a new voice and Plux seemed to have a different voice in contrast to his old voice from the GDC 2016 gameplay walkthrough video of the island. Plus, their voices are accompanied with dialogue or subtitles displayed at the bottom of the screen each time they speak just like in some Ratchet & Clank games such as Ratchet & Clank (PS4). Regarding their voices, their voice actors are yet to be revealed.

In other related news, Skylar & Plux: Adventure on Clover Island will make its debut at E3 this year, according to some tweets on Twitter from one of the members of Right Nice Games. This aforementioned collect-a-thon game will also be accompanied by fellow 3D platforming game, Yooka-Laylee, developed by Playtonic Games (a British video game developing team which consists of ex-Rare employees) and published by Team 17.